BOSTON -- Mark E. Robinson, one of Massachusetts Gov. William F. Weld's top officials and closest advisers, said yesterday that he is planning to leave the administration.
Robinson, Weld's secretary of administration and finance, said he will be returning to the private sector, but he did not say when or what his next job would be.
Robinson, 40, has been part of the Weld Administration since the governor took office in 1991. A graduate of the Boston University School of Law, he is said to be considering either a return to practicing law or working for a corporation.
Robinson first served as Weld's chief of staff and then moved over Co administration and finance in February 1993. He replaced Peter Nessen, a Democrat who had helped Weld, a Republican, structure his plan to improve the state's credit rating.
"It's really not that surprising that Mark has announced he will be leaving," said a former statehouse employee. "Mark had been talking about it for a few months, and this is a good time of the year to make a change in the administration."
The move was not considered a sign of any change in administration policy. Weld is running for re-election battle against state Rep. Mark Roosevelt, D-Boston.
Although Weld has not named Robinson's successor, several sources said that Charles D. Baker, the state's secretary of health and human services, has the inside track.
This is considered the best time of the year for the administration to make a change at the top because the fiscal 1995 budget is completed and the. state legislature is moving towards its summer recess.
Robinson has been an associate of Weld's since the early 1980s. When Weld was named the U.S. attorney for Massachusetts in 1981, Robinson served as an assistant U.S. attorney.
In 1986, he followed Weld to Washington, D.C., when President Reagan named Weld the assistant attorney general in charge of the Justice Department's criminal division.
Weld resigned from the post in 1988 over what he perceived to be the unethical behavior of Attorney General Edwin Meese in the Wedtech investigation. Robinson also resigned in 1988.
"Mark has done an outstanding job as secretary," a statehouse source said. "He will be missed, but be has also prepared a great staff if he were to return to the private sector."
Earlier this summer, the director of communications for Robinson, Dominic Slowey, also left state government to become the executive director of the statewide campaign for a graduated income tax.
